The Plateau State governor, Caleb Mutfwang, has lamented that terrorists have been occupying schools in some local governments of the state for several years.
Caleb stated on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programme on Tuesday that the terrorists occupied some schools in Barkin-Ladi and Bokkos Local Government Area of the state for five years without being dislodged.
He said, “As I am talking to you today, in Barkin-Ladi Local Government, schools have been occupied by these terrorists for some years now. Not less than 64 communities have been displaced and the lands have been taken over by these marauding terrorists.”
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Mutfwang insisted that failure to arrest or prosecute culprits is the factor fuelling the attacks for years.
“Part of the problem we have is that so far, there have been no arrests, no prosecution. Under the last regime, the feeling of the people in Plateau State, particularly the victims of these terrorist attacks, is that it looks as if the terrorists were given official government backing to be able to terrorise them because little or nothing was done to repel these attacks,” he said.
He continued: “I can tell you, that these schools that are being occupied didn’t start now; some of those schools have been occupied for the last three to five years. Children in those schools have had to relocate, and primary healthcare centres have been abandoned.
“I will be talking to Mr President on this. We need to summon the political will to give instructions to security agencies to protect the territorial integrity of Nigeria and even the internal integrity of our land boundaries.”
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This is coming barely a day after yet-to-be-identified gunmen on Christmas Eve killed 115 locals and injured several others in over 15 communities in the Bokkos and Barkin-Ladi Local Government Areas.
The governor added that the crisis has continued to escalate because of the lack of political will from the federal government.
In the last couple of months, the counterattacks between the Mwagavul, mostly farmers in Mangu local government and Fulani herdsmen, resulted in the death of hundreds.
